Passage3

Building the Skyline: The Birth and Growth of Manhattan’s Skyscrapers

搭建天际线：曼哈顿摩天人楼的诞生与发展

Katharine L. Shester reviews a book by Jason Barr about the development of New York City

凯瑟琳·L·谢斯特评价Jason Barr所署的关于纽约城发展史的一本书

In Building the Skyline, Jason Barr takes the reader through a detailed history of New York City. The book combines geology, history, economics, and a lot of data to explain why business clusters developed where they did and how the early decisions of workers and firms shaped the skyline we see today. Building the Skyline is organized into two distinct parts. The first is primarily historical and addresses New York’s settlement and growth from 1609 to 1900; the second deals primarily with the 20th century and is a compilation of chapters commenting on different aspects of New York’s urban development. The tone and organization of the book changes somewhat between the first and second parts, as the latter chapters incorporate aspects of Barr’s related research papers.

在《搭建天际线》一书中，Jason Barr带领读者穿越了一场纤毫人微的纽约城发展史。这本书融合了地理、历史、经济和大量数据来解释为什么商业集团选择在这里起家发展，以及工人和工厂的早期决策是如何塑造了我们今天所看到的这道天际线。《搭建天际线》包括泾渭分明的两部分。第一部分主要讲历史，描绘了纽约的选址定居和1609年至1900年间的发展；第二部分则聚焦于20世纪，其构成章节分别从不同的方面点评了纽约的都市建设进程。全书的格调和结构在第一和第二部分之间有着一些微妙的变化，因为后者的章节中融入了Barr本人一些相关研究论文中的部分内容。

Barr begins chapter one by taking the reader on a ‘helicopter time-machine’ ride – giving a fascinating account of how the New York landscape in 1609 might have looked from the sky. He then moves on to a subterranean walking tour of the city, indicating the location of rock and water below the subsoil, before taking the reader back to the surface. His love of the city comes through as he describes various fun facts about the location of the New York residence of early 19th-century vice-president Aaron Burr as well as a number of legends about the city.

巴尔开启第一章的方式是带读者坐上了一场“直升机时间机器之旅”——引人入胜地描绘了在1609年从空中看到的纽约风景是什么样的：他接下来又转入了一场城市地下漫步，向读者一一指出土壤下面岩石和水系的位置，然后才将他们带回到地面上。当他描述着关于19世纪早期副总统Aaron Burr在纽约住址的各式趣味小知识和关于这座城市的一系列传奇故事时，他对这座城市的热爱满纸可见。

Chapters two and three take the reader up to the Civil War (1861–1865), with chapter two focusing on the early development of land and the implementation of a grid system in 1811. Chapter three focuses on land use before the Civil War. Both chapters are informative and well researched and set the stage for the economic analysis that comes later in the book. I would have liked Barr to expand upon his claim that existing tenements* prevented skyscrapers in certain neighborhoods because ‘likely no skyscraper developer was interested in performing the necessary “slum clearance”’. Later in the book, Barr makes the claim that the depth of bedrock** was not a limiting factor for developers, as foundation costs were a small fraction of the cost of development. At first glance, it is not obvious why slum clearance would be limiting, while more expensive foundations would not.

第二章和第三章带读者去到了内战时期（1861年至1865年），其中第二章主要讲述了土地的早期发展和1811年所采用的一套网格系统。第三章聚焦于内战之前的土地使用。这两章都包含翔实的信息，研究工作做得很扎实，为书中后文里所做的经济分析铺垫了很好的背景。我其实很希望Barr能展开说说他的这个宣称：现有的廉租公寓在一些区域内阻碍了摩天大楼的建设，因为“很可能没有任何摩天大楼开发商有兴趣进行必要的‘贫民窟清理’”。在书的后文里，Barr又提出基岩的厚度对于开发商来说并不是一个限制因素，因为筑基成本只是全部建筑花费中的一小部分。乍一看来，为什么贫民窟清理是个限制因素而更费钱的筑基却不是，理由并不明显。

Chapter four focuses on immigration and the location of neighborhoods and tenements in the late 19th century. Barr identifies four primary immigrant enclaves and analyzes their locations in terms of the amenities available in the area. Most of these enclaves were located on the least valuable land, between the industries located on the waterfront and the wealthy neighborhoods bordering Central Park.

第四章集中讲述19世纪末期的移民以及居民处所和廉租公寓的位置。Barr确认了四块主要的移民聚居地，从该地区内所提供便民设施的角度分析了它们的位置：这些聚居地中的大多数都位于价值最低的土地上，介于滨水地带的工业区与毗邻中央公园的富人区之间。

Part two of the book begins with a discussion of the economics of skyscraper height. In chapter five, Barr distinguishes between engineering height, economic height, and developer height — where engineering height is the tallest building that can be safely made at a given time, economic height is the height that is most efficient from society’s point of view, and developer height is the actual height chosen by the developer, who is attempting to maximize return on investment.

书的第二部分以关于摩天大楼高度的经济学讨论开篇。在第五章中，Barr区分了工程学高度、经济学高度和开发商高度——工程学高度是在某个特定时期可以安全建造的最大高度，经济学高度是从社会角度来看最有效率的高度，而开发商高度则是开发商为了试图将投资的回报最大化所选择的实际高度。

Chapter five also has an interesting discussion of the technological advances that led to the construction of skyscrapers. For example, the introduction of iron and steel skeletal frames made thick, load-bearing walls unnecessary, expanding the usable square footage of buildings and increasing the use of windows and availability of natural light. Chapter six then presents data on building height throughout the 20th century and uses regression analysis to ‘predict’ building construction. While less technical than the research paper on which the chapter is based, it is probably more technical than would be preferred by a general audience.

第五章里还有一个关于技术进步促成摩天大楼建设的有趣讨论。例如，使用钢铁骨架结构使得厚厚的承重墙不再必要，如此一来也就扩大了楼宇的可用建筑面积，增加了对窗户的运用和自然光的引入。第六章进而呈现了整个20世纪里建筑高度的数据，使用了回归分析的方法来“预测”楼宇建筑。虽然这一章内容没有它所基于的研究论文那么艰深学术，但大约还是比普通读者大众所偏好的学术程度更艰深一些。

Chapter seven tackles the ‘bedrock myth’, the assumption that the absence of bedrock close to the surface between Downtown and Midtown New York is the reason for skyscrapers not being built between the two urban centers. Rather, Barr argues that while deeper bedrock does increase foundation costs, these costs were neither prohibitively high nor were they large compared to the overall cost of building a skyscraper. What I enjoyed the most about this chapter was Barr’s discussion of how foundations are actually built. He describes the use of caissons, which enable workers to dig down for considerable distances, often below the water table, until they reach bedrock. Barr’s thorough technological history discusses not only how caissons work, but also the dangers involved. While this chapter references empirical research papers, it is a relatively easy read.

第七章分析了“基岩之谜”，也就是这样一种假说，认为是由于在纽约下城和中城之间缺少接近地表的基岩层，所以导致这两个城市的中心地带之间没能建起摩天大楼。Barr却认为并非如此：虽然更深的基岩确实会增加筑基成本，然而这些成本既非高到离谱，与建造一幢摩天大楼的全盘费用比起来也算不上大笔开销。我在这章里最喜爱的内容是Barr关于地基实际如何建成的讨论。他描述了对于藻井的利用，它使得工人得以向下挖掘相当深的距离，通常能达到潜水面之下，直到触及基岩层。Barr细致入微的技术史记叙不但探讨了藻井是如何起作用的，而且还提及了其中牵涉到的风险。虽然这个章节也引用了实证性研究论文，但它相对还算易读。

Chapters eight and nine focus on the birth of Midtown and the building boom of the 1920s. Chapter eight contains lengthy discussions of urban economic theory that may serve as a distraction to readers primarily interested in New York. However, they would be well-suited for undergraduates learning about the economics of cities. In the next chapter, Barr considers two of the primary explanations for the building boom of the 1920s — the first being exuberance, and the second being financing. He uses data to assess the viability of these two explanations and finds that supply and demand factors explain much of the development of the 1920s; though it enabled the boom, cheap credit was not, he argues, the primary cause.

第八章和第九章聚焦在纽约中城区的诞生和20世纪20年代的建筑繁荣。第八章里包含了长篇大论的关于都市经济理论的讨论，这对于那些原本是出于对纽约的兴趣而翻阅本书的读者来说也许有点跑题。但是，对于那些学习城市经济学的本科生而言，就非常得其所哉了。在接下来的第九章里，Barr探讨了促成20世纪20年代建筑繁荣的两个最主要原因——首先是繁荣的环境，其次是金融支持。他运用了数据来评估这两种解释的合理性，发现供应和需求因素能在很大程度上解释20世纪20年代的发展；他也指出，虽然低息贷款使得这种繁荣成为可能，但它却并非首要原因。

In the final chapter (chapter 10), Barr discusses another of his empirical papers that estimates Manhattan land values from the mid-19th century to the present day. The data work that went into these estimations is particularly impressive. Toward the end of the chapter, Barr assesses ‘whether skyscrapers are a cause or an effect of high land values’. He finds that changes in land values predict future building height, but the reverse is not true. The book ends with an epilogue, in which Barr discusses the impact of climate change on the city and makes policy suggestions for New York going forward.

在最后一章（第十章）里，Barr讨论了他的另一篇实证性论文，预估了曼哈顿从20世纪中叶到现如今的土地价值。为了得出这些预估结果而进行的数据工作尤为令人印象深刻。在这一章接近尾声的时候，Barr评估了“摩天大楼究竟是高昂土地价值的原因还是结果”。他发现土地价值的变化预告了未来的建筑高度，但反过来则并非如此。全书以一篇后记收尾，Barr在其中讨论了气候变化对这座城市的影响，并为纽约城的未来发展提出了政策建议。

* a tenement: a multi-occupancy building of any sort, but particularly a run-down apartment building or slum building

公寓：任何类型的多人居住建筑，尤其是破旧的公寓楼或贫民窟建筑

** bedrock: the solid, hard rock in the ground that lies under a loose layer of soil

基岩：位于松散土层下方的坚硬岩石。